Charlotte Davies: Osmose

Many virtual environments reduce the observer to a disembodied state within a Cartesian space that is clear for miles around and often quite empty. Although Charlotte Davies's virtual environment Osmose (1995) has been exhibited only six times in North America and Europe, [1] it has received mote attention in the international discussion of media art than perhaps any other contemporary work. [2] Only a few thousand visitors have actually experienced the installation, but many times that number of art aficionados have avidly followed the debate on aesthetics, phenomenology, and reception of virtual art that has homed in on this particular work.

Moreover, Osmose cultivates the user-interface—a central parameter of virtual art—at a level that is still unequaled; an independent treatise could be written on this aspect alone. Osmose is a technically advanced and visually impressive simulation of a series of widely branching natural and textual spaces: a mineral/vegetable, intangible sphere. Nothing recalls the grainy, jittery, polygonal images of virtual art's early years; in the data space of the Canadian Charlotte Davies, phosphorescing points of light glimmer in the dark in soft focus. Osmose is an immersive interactive environment, involving head mounted display (HMD), 3-D computer graphics, and interactive sound, which can be explored synaesthetically. [3] On a second level, the installation offers visitors the opportunity to follow the individual interactor's journey of images through this simulacrum of nature. With the aid of polarized glasses, they watch his or her constantly changing perspectives of the three-dimensional image wotlds on a large-scale projection screen. The images are generated exclusively by the interactor, whose moving silhouette can be discerned dimly on a pane of frosted glass. The solitude of the interactor is intentional, for it intensifies the individual experience of the virtual space. The structure of the installation, a combination of a stand-alone system and a darkened auditorium with a screen, is reminiscent of a studio theater or cinema (fig. 5.1).

By kind permission of the artist.

Like a diver, solitary and weightless, the interactor first glides out of a grid of Cartesian coordinates into the virtual scenarios (fig. 5.2): a boundless oceanic abyss, shimmering swathes of opaque clouds, passing softly glowing dewdrops and translucent swarms of computer-generated insects, into the dense undergrowth of a dark forest. Passage from one scenario to the next is smooth, fluid. Whereas early virtual environments utilized portals that rendered transitions abrupt, in the image world of Osmose the observer experiences osmotic transitions from one sphere to the next, seeing one slowly fade before it amalgamates into the next. Naturally, this means that the two image spaces have to be generated simultaneously. The HMD stereo monitors immediately in front of the eyes allow the interactor to pass into subterranean earth, encountering there vivid rocks and roots (fig. 5.3), and, finally, to enter the microcosmos of a tree's glistening, opalescent leaf. [4]

Figure 5.2
Charlotte Davies, Osmose, 1995. Detail: forest and grid.

[Char Davies, Forest Grid, from Osmose, 1995] †

Digital image captured in real-time
through head-mounted display during live immersive journey/performance.

By kind permission of the artist.

At the center of this data space stands a leafless tree in a clearing, representative and isolated. Its trunk and branches gleam like crystal, entirely transparent and permeable to its very center. Osmose is both a solid mineral and a fluid intangible sphere, a non-Cartesian space. A symbol of life, fertility, and regeneration in almost every culture, the tree's iconography can be traced through all cultures and epochs. Now it grows here: the tree of virtual worlds. Looking down from the top of the digital tree, in which the biological process of osmosis is mysticized, aureoled, and merged with the technical images, the tangled network of roots appears to resemble a distant galaxy, yet as the observer approaches, it evokes a microcosmos.

Two textual worlds serve as parentheses around this simulacrum of nature: The 20,000 lines of program code for the work are visible in the virtual environment, arranged in colossal columns; and a space filled with fragments of text-concepts of nature, technology, and bodies, all penned by thinkers, such as Bachelard, Heidegger, and Rilke, whose ideas were untouched by recent revolutionary developments concerning the image. The fact that the computer program is visible does not detract substantially from the immersive experience; it reveals in part the binary foundations of the image spaces and, in this way, makes the observer aware of the origins of the illusion. The ensemble of virtual spaces in Osmose is structured as follows:

Ensemble arrangement of virtual spaces in Osmose, 1995.

The illusion emerges from the high-capacity memories of three Onyx2 Infinite Reality Silicon Graphics workstations. Formerly, these supercomputers were used for military simulations and film sequences, and in 1995, they still cost more than a million U.S. dollars. [5] Most of the enormous program was written by John Harrison (VR software), who had already created the custom software for Brenda Laurel's virtual reality environment Placeholder ar the Banff Center, and the computer graphics are by George Mauro. The program enables registration of the motion-capture devices, the real-time computation of the images, [6] and control of the sonic architecture, designed and programmed by Dorota Blaszczak. The sound was composed and programmed by Rick Bidlack. Although a vast amount of complex equipment was utilized, the project remained a manageable process. It is not unusual for ten programmers to work simultaneously on a virtual environment, but Osmose was created in a mere six months by three people who produced the concept, design, and program. As with most virtual artworks, for example, The Home of the Brain, the majority of drafts were rejected: "We first tried many tests to try and get soft and luminous effects. Along with this were experiments in various sorts of navigation using breath and balance, which culminated in the system we now use. For each new idea that we used in Osmose, perhaps 10 to 20 ideas were thrown away." [7]

Char Davies began her career as a painter and filmmaker. From 1973 to 1978 she studied liberal arts in the United States and Canada and, from 1987, she concentrated exclusively on the visual potential of the computer. She joined the startup company SoftImage in Montreal, which, at the time, had a workforce of three, and has been one of the driving forces in the creative development of complex computer graphics software ever since. In this period, her artistic works were mainly in the area of computer graphics for which she received several awards from major festivals. [8] By 1994, SoftImage employed over 200 people and Char Davies was its vice president. When the company's programs brought the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park to screen life, an amazed world took note of these pioneers and the software giant Microsoft bought SoftImage for 130 million U.S. dollars. It was a strategic acquisition, strictly in line with Bill Gates's vision of the infrastructure of the future: a vastly speeded-up Internet combined with virtual image spaces. Under Microsoft, Davies held the privileged position of artistic director. In 1998 she became independent again and founded her own firm, Immersence. She is also a Ph.D. fellow with Roy Ascott—in company with many other prominent computer artists—at the Centre for Advanced Inquiry in the Interactive Arts (CAiiA) at the University of Wales College, Newport. With her close relationship to the development of advanced graphics techniques, Char Davies is one of the driving forces of creative development of complex computer graphics programs.

The Suggestive Potential of the Interface

[Char Davies, Subterranean Earth, from Osmose, 1995] †

Digital image captured in real-time
through head-mounted display during live immersive journey/performance.

By kind permission of the artist.

Char Davies's objective, to develop a natural interface, is a groundbreaking one. The user-interface is the point of contact where humans and machines meet in order for exchange to take place. It can take many forms. It is at the interface, which must be used by the active observer according to the rules of the particular illusion world, that the structures of the simulation designed for communication meet up wich the human senses. Thus, the interface in virtual reality functions pervasively as the key to the digital artwork and molds both the perception and the dimensions of interaction. The observer, whom Davies refers to as "the immersant," controls navigation through this virtual reality installation by means of a vest filled with sensors. This is donned before the journey can begin, and it tracks each breath and each movement of the torso and relays this information to the software. Then the corresponding virtual image effects, which create the impression of moving through the image space, follow in real time. Although the heavy HMD actually only supplies the visual field with images, it creates the suggestive impression of full-body immersion in the virtual environment. The feeling of being in the images, produced by the spatially enveloping visual impression, is thus amplified. Like a scuba diver, the observer floats upward with lungs filled wich air, whereas regular breathing produces a calm and balanced stare. Divers are well acquainted with the feeling of immersion, the physical experience of being completely enveloped and slowly floating through the watery element. Not surprisingly, it was being underwater that gave Char Davies (who is a passionate diver) the inspiration for this finely gauged, physically intimate synthesis of the technical and the organic. Because the interface technique of Osmose utilizes intuitive physical processes, the observer's unconscious connects to the virtual space in a much more intense way than wich a joystick or a mouse.

In virtual reality, the interface is key to the media artwork and defines the character of interaction and perception. The effect is a profound feeling of embodied presence, which, in the course of the "immersion," results in an emotional state of being that is heightened still further by the music. Each zone has its own localized sound; in fact, sound in general plays a decisive role in generating the feeling of presence. [9] It accentuates the visual impressions, where expansive space alternates with microcosmic proximity, increasing the density of the natural phenomena. The sonic architectute is expressly designed for each image world space: The observer associates frogs croaking and birdsong and hears repeated bass tones that evoke meditative effects. Although many people who have experienced the fifteen-minute immersion in Osmose are convinced that they heard musical instruments and the sounds of insects, the sound is based on the sampling of a male and a female voice. Reponses from many of the several thousand "immersants" mentioned "contemplative, meditative peace," "fascinating, awe-inspiring depth," and feeling "gently cradled." These impressions are confirmed almost without exception if one looks at the relevant discussion groups on the Internet or the comments in the visitors' books at the exhibitions where Osmose was on view.. [10] The book of visitors' comments from the Barbican Art Gallery in London contained the following: "I had a vertigo when looking down.."; "After the initial panic, it was amazing and relaxing…"; and "What a relief to get a go! That was truly the most mind-expanding piece of art I've ever been a part of…" A number of participants even claimed they had been put in a trancelike state. Although the choice of words is reminiscent of esoteric rhetoric, it does reflect a cardinal effect of virtual reality: The suggestive presence in a totality of images gives rise to a mental—in Osmose, meditative—absorption. The psychological power of this new art of illusion becomes apparent in this work as in no other of the genre.

This physically intimate design of the human-machine interface gives rise to such immersive experiences that the artist speaks of reaffirming the participants' corporeality; Davies even expresses the hope that a spatio-temporal context is created "in which to explore the self's subjective experience of 'being-in-the-world'—as embodied consciousness in an enveloping space where boundaries between inner/outer, and mind/body dissolve." [11] She relates this to "archetypal aspects of nature and to interior psychological space simultaneously ." [12] Prerequisite to the attainment of this goal is immersion experienced in solitude, a subjective experience in the image world. In this space, the images of other immersants' journeys, avatars, or "subjective" agents would only distract the participant from the suggestive/absorbed state.

Osmose offers a totally new reality, a cascade of alternative realities that, through physical and mental presence in the image world, effect a fusion and a moment of transcendence-this applies to nearly all historical spaces of immersion. Although Osmose creates contemplative impressions, even meditative effects, this type of art reception does represent a significant innovation. The body is addressed polysensually and immersion is produced with the techniques of illusion. This full-body inclusion demands—irrespective of the gender of the immersant—that the observer relinquish distant and reserved experience of art and, instead, embrace eccentric, mind-expanding—or mind-assailing—experience of images. Thus, the character of immersive art is revealed as located within a bipolar field of tension. Like the Villa dei Misteri or the battle panoramas, the maximized, suggestive potential of the images aims at ecstatic affects, and this also includes regressive effects. In a number of theoretical texts, Davies has outlined her artistic intentions and view of immersive virtual space: "I think of immersive virtual space as a spatio-temporal arena, wherein mental models or abstract constructs of the world can be given virtual embodiment in three dimensions and then kinesthetically, synaesthetically explored through full-body immersion and interaction. No other space allows this, no other medium of human expression." [13]

The more intensely a participant is involved, interactively and emotionally, in a virtual reality, the less the computer-generated world appears as a construction: Rather, it is construed as personal experience. Before Osmose, this realization was applicable to simulated air battles, but since the advent of this work, it has become clear that slow and gentle navigation of image spaces can also produce a high degree of potential power of visual suggestion. The manner in which Osmose realizes "virtual reality" is the work's strength; at the same time it nourishes reservations and presentiments concerning possible future manipulation of observers' emotionality via images. Although it is a technical illusion, visually Osmose suggests a biosphere that functions in such a way that, for example, persons who would normally avoid being underwater have phobic reactions: "I, however, experienced several of the worlds in the piece as an occasion for panic. Like many asthmatics, being underwater makes me deeply and instantly afraid. Evidently, even when the water is symbolic, I experience it viscerally as water and as everything smothering that water means to me…" [14] Apparently, the new medium of virtual reality reactivates a mechanism of suggestion that historically has been present in all new media of illusion, whether the panorama or the film. Yet it is not the aim of the artist to create a substitute for nature. Her representations of the organic do not conjure up the chimera of digital realism, nor are they abstract. Rather, it is the old artistic trick of sfumato, which deceives the eye and facilitates multifaceted associations.

Summarizing the discussion centered on Osmose, two basic, polarized trends can be identified. First, the work promotes a new stage in an intimate, mind-expanding synthesis with technology [15] —this is a comforting argument, an old variant of uncritical faith in machines. Second, Osmose confirms the opinion of those who see in the ideology of the natural interface a new level in the history of ideas and images of illusionism, [16] or who dismiss Osmose as virtual kitsch. [17] The adherents of virtual reality, who have often reiterated their claim that immersion in virtual reality intensifies their relationship with nature, [I8] might ponder the following question: Why the immense technological effort in order to return, after a gigantic detour, to the real? Does not the quest for nature using technical means resemble the plane curve of a hyperbola pretending to be an ellipse?

It will soon be possible to access image spaces that depend on huge amounts of data, like Osmose, via the Internet through ongoing speed-up and new techniques of file compression. Just as in 1800 the Academie FranÃ§aise envisaged that the panorama would lead to the development of easily accessible and cheap technology, Davies also hopes that progress in media technology will bring her image worlds to a far wider group of users. [19]

All elements combine to endow Osmose with a flowing and coherent quality that envelops the participant totally. As mentioned above, the totality of the effect is strengthened further because it dispenses with the use of portals and clearly defined boundaries between the image worlds in favor of osmotic transitions. For example, the immersant appears to move through a luminous digital tree. For Martin Buber, contemplating a tree was an occasion to reflect on conscious experience: "It may so happen, by grace and will combined, that I, in contemplating the tree, become enclosed within the relationship to it and then it is no longer an It. The power of wholeness has captured me." [20] All is unified, indistinguishably: "Image and movement, genus and example, law and number." [21] An aesthetic impression of immersion is a primary characteristic of virtual reality. However, being enveloped in a cocoon of images imposes profound limitations on the ability for critical detachment, a decisive hallmark of modern thought that has always played a central role in experience of and reflections on art.

Aesthetic Distance

When actually immersed in a high-resolution, 360Â° illusion space, it is only with great difficulty that an observer can maintain any distance from the work or objectify it. It is well-nigh impossible to perceive it as an autonomous aesthetic object. If media competence results from the faculty or learned ability to objectify a given medium, then this mechanism is diminished in virtual installations. The designers use all means at their disposal to banish this from the consciousness of the recipients. At best, the medium of virtual reality can be objectified through knowledge and critique of the image production methods and an understanding of their technical, physiological, and psychological mechanisms, for everything is an image.

As the interfaces seem to dissolve and achieve more natural and intuitive designs so that the illusionary symbiosis of observer and work progresses, the more psychological detachment, the distance from the work vanishes. Without it, a work cannot be perceived as an autonomous aesthetic object. Inside the "omnipresence" of virtuality, any mechanism of knowledge acquisition will be affected and influenced. In virtual environments, a fragile, core element of art comes under threat: the observer's act of distancing that is a prerequisite for any critical reflection. Aesthetic distance always comprises the possibility of attaining an overall view, of understanding organization, structure, and function, and achieving a critical appraisal. This includes searching for hypotheses, identifications, recollections, and associations. Notwithstanding the longing for "transcending boundaries" and "abandoning the self," the human subject is constituted in the act of distancing; this is an integral part of the civilizational process. As Adorno expressed it: "distance is the primary condition for getting close to the content of a work. It is implicit in the Kantian notion of disinterestedness, which demands of the aesthetic stance that it should not seek to grasp the object…. Distance is a phenomenon of works of art that transcends their mere existence; their absolute proximity would mean their absolute integration." [22] Michel Serres points out that it is only in the fixed artwork whose elements the onlooker "sets into motion" does the spatial configuration become a vivid sensory event. [23] And in Arnold Gehlen's view, "direct emotionality of experience is held to be alien to art, and rightly so," [24] and both Hans Jonas [25] and Hartmut Boehme advance arguments against an aesthetics where distance is absent. Both thinkers stress the subject-constitutive, epistemological quality of distance, which Boehme expresses thus: "All happiness is immersion in flesh and cancels the history of the subject. All consciousness is emancipation from the flesh to which nature subjects us."[26]

The more "natural" the interfaces become. the greater the danger—not only that most of the "technological iceberg" will be inaccessible to the user who is unaware of it—that there will be an illusionary disappearance of boundaries to the data space. Increasingly powerful computers increase the suggestive potential of virtuality, which, particularly through the ideology of a "natural interface," is beginning to unfold its full psychological and manipulative influence. Against the backdrop of virtual reality's illusionism, which targets all the senses for illusion, the dissolution of the interface is a political issue.

In addition to things based on the familiar, computer-generated virtual reality allows the creation of aesthetics that are no longer bound to physical laws and which will become, with faster computers, more real, gripping, and involving. The potential option of perception will be weightlessness, that is, floating through image worlds, touching and transforming computer-generated matter, changes of surfaces and textures, spaces of gigantic and awesome proportions, experienceable individually or collectively, vertiginous heights and depths, speeds that produce euphoria or paralysis. It is within the realm of probability that the "shock," which Walter Benjamin diagnosed as being film's aesthetic innovation, will undergo renewal and intensification—with far more sophisticated means. The most obvious symptom of this loss of distance will be a voyeuristic, dissecting penetration of representations of objects and bodies. [27] In conjunction with the attempt to generate the feeling of real presence, these impressions, which run counter to habitual perception according to nature's laws, may result in problems of perception that should not be underestimated. The serious contradiction between corporeal reality and artificial image illusion is likely to be at a level that almost precludes rational access. Confirmation of this is provided by first results of research conducted on "simulator sickness": impairment of motor control, vision, and gastric functions; apathy, disorientation, migraine, indisposition, and vomiting have all been diagnosed as physical effects. [28]

This article may include minor changes from the original publication in order to improve legibility and layout consistency within the Immersence Website. † Significant changes from the original text have been indicated in red square brackets.